ICICI opens public bond market with $2 billion deal

The deal is significantly upsized, and while some argue that the price is too cheap, all agree that it is great news for Asia's bond markets.

ICICI took the market by surprise early yesterday morning when it succeeded in raising $2 billion in bonds, a significant upsize to the expected initial benchmark deal of between $500 million and $1 billion.

The five-year transaction for the Indian bank, managed by Deutsche Bank, Merrill Lynch and Goldman Sachs, attracted $6.05 billion in demand and priced with a coupon of 6.625%, a yield of 6.645% and a price of 99.916. This equates to a spread over five-year treasuries of...